At least one very serious prosecutor thinks so…

You won’t see this at al.com. Comments welcome…

The Case for Why Siegelman’s Verdict Should Be Overturned

by Glynn Wilson

Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman was cooking a pizza at his Birmingham home when I got him on the phone Thursday night to talk about his appeal coming up on the ninth of December in Atlanta.

Glynn Wilson

Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman in front of the federal courthouse in Montgomery on a break from his sentencing hearing in June, 2007.

I called to ask about the appeal and other things, like his reaction to the election of Barack Obama as president and the somewhat less-than-stellar performance of the Alabama Democratic Party in the same election.

He had some thoughts on how the state party could have done a much better job, and he was disappointed to see another Republican elected to the state Supreme Court. He was surprised the state went so heavily for Senator John McCain, who won Alabama’s nine electoral votes with 60 percent of the overall vote and maybe 80 percent of the white vote.

For now I’ll keep most of his comments private on the problems with the state party and save them for a more detailed analysis in the works for later. Here the focus is mostly on the appeal.

But I have to report that Siegelman got excited when he talked about the Obama landslide, which he called “astounding” and “stunning.” And he talked in the language of a policy wonk on how the campaign did it: A massive and highly effective Web and Internet fundraising campaign, block-by-block nationwide canvassing, educated and dedicated workers at every level, not to mention one of the smartest, most articulate, gracious, and calm-under-fire candidates since John F. Kennedy in 1960.

“It was without a doubt the most impressive and effective campaign in the history of politics,” he said. “Too bad we couldn’t do more with that on the state level.”

He was reluctant to talk in great detail about his hearing before a three-judge appeals court panel in less than a month, especially considering how Chief U.S. District Judge Mark E. Fuller in Montgomery sentenced him to a number of months of extra jail time last summer for talking about the case to the media.

But he is hopeful the court will find its way to justice and throw out the case and let his co-defendant Richard Scrushy out of prison by Christmas.

While we were talking on the phone and he ate his pizza, he also managed to e-mail me a copy of the Time magazine story about to come out on the Web and in this week’s edition. He had not had time to evaluate it or react to it. After reading the story and my take on it the next morning, Siegelman told the TPMMuckraker on Friday he considered it “another shocking revelation in the misconduct of the U.S. attorney’s offices.”

He called the level of manipulation of the prosecution team by U.S. Attorney Leura Canary, who supposedly recused herself from the case because of her involvement along with her husband Bill Canary in previous political campaigns with Siegelman’s opponents, another example of the “outrageous criminal conduct in the U.S. Attorney’s office and the Department of Justice.”

He said further that what the Time story revealed was “more frightening than anything that has come before.” And he believes that his case is just the “tip of the iceberg” in terms of politicized prosecutions by the Bush Justice Department, with the full knowledge and direction of former White House aide Karl Rove and most likely Bush himself.

Solid Arguments

A detailed analysis of the appeals briefs in the case reveal four solid arguments the appeals court panel could stand on to reverse the conviction, order a mistrial, or reduce the sentence.

The first and perhaps most important reason for the court to completely dismiss the case is the lack of substantial proof of an explicit quid pro quo, a Latin and legal term meaning “something for something,” for Siegelman’s appointment of Scrushy to the state hospital regulatory board. This exchange was supposedly for contributions of $500,000 to pay off the debt on an education-lottery campaign, none of which went into Siegelman’s pocket.

The jury in the case heard the prosecution hammer this point about a “tit-for-tat” exchange over and over again during the final weeks of the trial. But in their appeals brief, Siegelman’s attorneys point out that according to precedent, the quid pro quo would have to be proved beyond a reasonable doubt among all of the charges — conspiracy, mail fraud, and bribery. And, they argue that in addition to insufficient proof, Judge Fuller’s jury charge did not make this clear. They ask for complete acquittal on those grounds alone.

Glynn Wilson

Scott Horton speaks to a North Alabama media reform group in April.

According to New York attorney Scott Horton, who has followed the case closely and written about it himself for the Harper’s magazine Website and The Daily Beast, the tit-for-tat business the way it was used in this case has “broad consequences for the political world.”

He said in an e-mail interview if the standard that the prosecution argued and Fuller implicitly accepted is correct, “politicians around the country should be in jail right now. Indeed, that number would arguably include Judge Fuller, whose appointment to the federal bench by George W. Bush followed a lifetime of contributions to Republican campaigns.”

He pointed out that it would include the 146 individuals who gave $100,000 or more to the Bush-Cheney campaign who received appointments to federal jobs in return.

Two, on the bribery charge, the appeal brief argues that the statute of limitations had run out. The timing of the alleged bribe was never spelled out in the original indictment, but the judge allowed the prosecution team to nail down the details later. This is a shoddy way to run a prosecution at best.

In an earlier interview, Siegelman’s attorney in the early phases of the case, Doug Jones, said he agreed to wave the statute of limitations on the alleged bribery in the interest of appearing to cooperate fully with the prosecutors in the investigation. But that was at a time when he was being told that the chances of an indictment were slim, well before the “top down review” of the case from Washington he testified about last year before the House Judiciary Committee.

It is clear from the dates looking back now that the alleged crime of passing checks in exchange for the appointment took place in the summer of 1999. Scrushy was appointed to the CON board on July 26, 1999, and the prosecution’s evidence showed the first check from Scrushy was received about that time. The indictment came down on May 17, 2005. For the bribery indictment to be valid, the crimes would have had to take place after May 17, 2000.

The prosecution brought its case too late. Case closed. Charges dismissed, except in a courtroom run by a political opponent of Siegelman with a mandate from the Republican White House to dispatch a brand of political justice only allowed in corrupt, criminal empires.

This should have been dealt with by the judge and should never have made it to the jury. But as we now know, the judge was not acting as an honest broker.

While some newspaper reporters and members of the public may scoff at this notion of dropping the case on appeal based on a technicality, perhaps they should consider the argument that this alleged bribe was nothing more and nothing less than a political contribution. And it’s not like Scrushy needed to give Siegelman money to sit on the board. His role as founder of one of the most innovative health care companies in the state and country at that time would have warranted him a position on the board without the contribution. He sat on the board under previous Republican governors.

Glynn Wilson

HealthSouth founder Richard Scrushy and his wife Leslie in front of the federal courthouse in Montgomery in June, 2007.

While people have a right to dislike Scrushy for the way he treated people and for cashing in his stock options as the tech bubble was bursting and costing many people great sums of money who had invested in HealthSouth, if the government was going to put him in jail for his role in “cooking the books” in that case they should have convicted him in the Birmingham trial, which was botched by another political appointee, U.S. Attorney Alice Martin, a Republican of questionable qualifications placed in her office for her loyalty to George Bush and the GOP.

Certainly the practice of rewarding loyal political subjects and campaign contributors with jobs should be reformed. But the question people should ask themselves is this: Is the best way to accomplish that throwing innocent people in jail?

Three, on the issue of juror misconduct, the very idea of jurors reading news coverage online and e-mailing each other about the case outside the jury deliberation room would be instant grounds for a mistrial in any honest court. It is clear that the judge and prosecution team in this case did not fully investigate this issue by examining computers and e-mail addresses used by jurors or by questioning the jury or U.S. marshals at length about this.

The new disclosures by Time magazine this week make clear that claims of juror misconduct in the case “are much more substantial than Siegelman or his attorneys knew when they filed their arguments,” Horton says. “In fact, there were improper communications between prosecutors and at least one juror. And it was one of the jurors implicated in the existing misconduct concerns.”

In other words, one of the jurors who was communicating with the prosecution through the U.S. marshals’ service about a romantic relationship with one of the prosecution team was also one of the jurors who read news coverage online and sent e-mails to other jurors trying to get them to find Scrushy and Siegelman guilty.

“Moreover,” Horton says, “the Justice Department hid these facts from the court and the opposing counsel. At this point it seems clear that the jury was corrupted, and that the Justice Department played an active role in that process.”

I have covered many court trials over the past 28 years as a reporter, and I have never seen any judge, Republican or Democrat, who would allow this kind of shenanigans to go on. It is simply outrageous and someone should be held accountable for it.

If the conservative newspapers in Alabama can’t see this, then I have no sympathy for them for their falling circulation numbers. It is irresponsible journalism of the highest order to allow this kind of corruption of the court system — no matter what your political-editorial slant.

Then finally, without citing the affidavit of GOP whistle-blower Jill Simpson or raising the issue of a conflict of interest on the part of the judge themselves, Siegelman’s attorneys adopt all of the arguments in the appeals brief of Richard Scrushy, who does cite Simpson’s claims, and argues that Fuller should not have sat in judgment in the case while he was in the defense contracting business with the federal government. As has been previously reported ad nauseum, Fuller was a lawyer in the defense contracting business in South Alabama when President George W. Bush appointed him to the court — just in time to take up the case and knock Siegelman out of the race for governor.

Doss Aviation, a company in which Fuller owned a controlling interest, received a $117 million contract with the Air Force on the day Siegelman was convicted. If Fuller had been appointed by a Democrat, you would have been able to hear the screams of the conservative newspapers in Alabama on Fox News, all the way to New York.

While some attorneys have expressed skepticism that the appeals court panel will rule favorably on this claim, we think they should consider it, especially since the prosecution team goes to great lengths to tie Siegelman and Scrushy together in an unholy conspiracy. There seems to be plenty of evidence that the bigger conspiracy was on the other side and directed by Karl Rove with the full knowledge of the president himself.

There is an attorney in Montgomery who could shed considerable light on the extent to which George W. Bush was interested in keeping up with developments in the Siegelman case. We won’t name him for now, but we know from talking to other sources who have heard it from him that Bush was in the loop in this case. On top of all the other grounds for impeachment, this would certainly add to the list. Unfortunately, the hierarchy of the Democratic Party refused to pursue this for the past couple of years, and now it is too late.

Then consider what it would be like if you were on trial in a case like this. Would you want to sit in a courtroom and place your fate in the hands of a judge who did millions of dollars in outside business with the U.S. government, the military, and the FBI? Common sense, and basic ethical considerations, should raise red flags in the mind of any honest person on this score — especially appeals court judges.

The Siegelman brief asks for a complete dismissal of the verdict in the case on appeal and for a judgment of acquittal. Short of that, it asks for an order for a mistrial and reassignment to another judge if there is a retrial.

It would be very unusual for an appeals court to “smack down” a district court judge in “quite so harsh a manner,” Horton says. “On the other hand, their ruling setting Siegelman free already indicated what I’d call a lack of patience with Fuller. They clearly suspect something extremely foul and have not acted on it.”

At least not yet.

Glynn Wilson

Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman had clearly lost some weight while he was in prison last year. He is shown here having a little fun at the Jefferson-Jackson dinner in Birmingham May 2.

In the response brief from federal prosecutors, they counter all these arguments with legal boilerplate language that looks as though it was copied and pasted from a computer program. There is simply nothing in it worth citing or reporting. From an objective point of view, it is simply not believable.

If the court rejects any of the options laid out by Siegelman’s lawyers, they make a detailed case for why he should be released for time served (nine months) because of the unconstitutional addition to his sentence for exercising his First Amendment rights of free speech to talk to the media.

They cite an internal report from the Bush Justice Department itself which said there is “significant evidence of selective prosecution” and “extensive evidence that the prosecution [was] directed or promoted by Washington officials, likely including former White House Deputy Chief of Staff and Advisor to the President Karl Rove, and that political considerations influenced the decision to bring charges.”

In other words, the case was political. That’s not the purpose of courts. Case closed.

And then, of course, there are implications for the future of American jurisprudence on how this case comes out, beyond the immediate fate of Don Siegelman, Horton says.

“Leura Canary and her team have been fending off a Congressional probe of their misconduct with claims that the case is still active and they cannot therefore be compelled to testify before Congress,” Horton says. “Canary did, however, submit a representation to Congress to the effect that she had no involvement in the case after major decisions were taken — a claim which has now been objectively established as untruthful. Making false statements to Congress is potentially punishable as a felony.”

In addition, Canary’s office has refused to release more than 600 pages of documents about the case, including e-mails, letters, and memos.

When the court of appeals rules in the case, perhaps by Christmas, the case will be close to its legal conclusion, Horton said, other than an appeal to the United States Supreme Court.

“Then their stonewalling tactics will come to an end,” he said. He called the hearing on the ninth of December and their decision in this case a “day of reckoning for the Eleventh Circuit.”

“This is a court overwhelmingly dominated with Republican judges, most of whom have gotten to the bench after a career engagement in GOP politics,” he says. “Will they be able to put their partisan interests aside and deal fairly with a Democrat who has been abused by a Republican administration? We’ll know shortly.”

The Alabama Democratic Party is calling on the Republican Congressional campaigns of Wayne Parker in District 5 and Jay Love in District 2 to reimburse Alabama taxpayers for the full travel and security costs of Vice President Cheney’s brief fundraising trip Thursday to Huntsville.

Some smart activist placed this “Impeach Bush” sign over the Interstate in Huntsville on the day Bush was to visit.

President George W. Bush was scheduled to appear. Instead, he got stuck in Washington, D.C., where he was holed up with his economic advisers formulating a plan to nationalize the banking industry and dole out $900 billion in corporate welfare to failing banks and insurance companies.

While President Bush’s visit to the state was originally supposed to include a tour of a waste-to-energy steam plant in Huntsville, Vice President Cheney was in Alabama only long enough to hold a closed-door fundraiser for Parker and Love.

“It is not fair for Alabama taxpayers to pick up the tab so that Wayne Parker and Jay Love can have Dick Cheney in for a closed-door fundraiser to help fill their campaign coffers,” said Jim Spearman, Executive Director of the Alabama Democratic Party. “At a time when middle class Alabama families are being squeezed and our country’s economy is facing a crisis, the last thing Wayne Parker and Jay Love should be doing is bringing Vice President Cheney in for a private party and asking the taxpayers to foot the bill.”

The Government Accountability Office (GAO), a non-partisan government agency tasked with monitoring federal spending, calculates the cost to operate Air Force Two at about $60,000 per hour. Beyond that, there are costs for the security detail required, including the time served by Alabama law enforcement officers during the motorcade procession.

“With people at the fundraiser paying $10,000 for a picture, these campaigns can certainly find a way to make sure the hard-working taxpayers of our state aren’t shouldering any of the financial burden here,” Spearman said.

Bush Cancels Huntsville Visit, Sends Cheney Instead

by Glynn Wilson

Artur Davis, the soft-spoken and little-known Congressman who represents much of the area from Birmingham to Tuscaloosa, was in town this weekend while Congress takes a break from the August heat in Washington, D.C.

Glynn Wilson

Rep. Artur Davis at the Young Democrats cookout

Dressed casually in gray slacks and a blue buttoned-down shirt, Davis showed up to shake some hands at the Birmingham Young Democrats’ cookout in George Ward Park on Southside.

I was able to catch up with him for a few minutes to press my concerns about the threat to the Fourth Amendment’s protections against “unreasonable” searches and seizures, and to finally get some answers to questions his press staff seem incapable of responding to — electronically or otherwise.

In northeastern Jefferson County, where a concern for the Second Amendment’s protections for gun ownership are paramount politically, very few people have ever even heard of Davis. An unscientific survey of average working people in Clay, Pinson, Center Point, Trussville, and Roebuck shows that he has almost no name recognition in this part of the world.

And since the newspapers and television news stations and radio talk shows in Alabama spend almost no time covering such “trivial” things as the threat to the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution from the Bush administration’s illegal spying operations over the past seven years, the average construction worker here doesn’t seem to be particularly concerned about that either.

But among active Democrats who were in attendance at the cookout, there is an awareness that Davis — along with Barack Obama, the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee for president to run against Republican John McCain — voted for the new Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which included a provision exempting telecommunications companies such as ATnT from lawsuits for their admitted role in illegally spying on Americans since 9/11.

The main reason Davis supported the bill, he said, was political.

Since Davis endorsed Obama early on, and since President George W. Bush threatened to veto any FISA bill that did not contain telecom immunity, the moderate Democrats who hold sway in both houses of Congress did not want to give McCain ammunition in the last three months of the presidential election race by allowing the spying law to expire in August.

McCain could have used that as evidence that the Democrats are “weak on terror,” Davis said — as if he wasn’t going to run ads saying that very thing anyway. He has already.

In his defense, Davis did offer a legal answer to the question as well.

Davis is a Harvard-educated lawyer who interned at the Southern Poverty Law Center and clerked for U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson — the federal judge who ordered Judge Roy Moore’s Ten Commandments Monument out of the State Supreme Court building in Montgomery and one of my personal heroes. He also worked as an assistant U.S. attorney before running for Congress, unlike Alabama’s current attorney general Troy King, who had never tried a case in court.

Standing in the George Ward Park pavilion with the aroma of barbecued chicken in the air, Davis made the case that the new FISA bill was an improvement over the old one.

Under the old law, passed in 1978 in response to President Nixon’s abuse of federal resources to spy on opposing political activist groups, there was no provision for protecting American citizens abroad, Davis said. The new law extends those rights overseas beyond the nation’s physical borders “for the first time,” he said. It was a compromise the Democrats would never have gotten out of the Bush administration just a few months ago, he claims.

The new law also strengthens monitoring of the federal government’s spying by the so-called FISA court, he said, although critics have said the court is nothing more than a “rubber stamp” for the executive branch, no matter who is in power.

The new bill also changes the language for obtaining warrants to spy on Americans from “probable cause” to “reasonable suspicion,” he said, although in a country run by an Imperial President who thinks he is a king who derives his power from God and is not beholden to the law, that improvement seems hardly enough to stop the abuses.

Which brings us to the last issue, where Davis makes a good point.

Whether the law is enforced in a way that protects civil liberties “rests on the integrity of the executive,” Davis said.

So he is hoping one of the questioners at this year’s presidential debates makes sure to ask Senator John McCain the question: “Can we count on you to be responsible in enforcing the FISA law?”

Or, in other words, will you abuse the power of the presidency to spy on political opponents, like Nixon and Bush? We might also add: Will you also politicize the Justice Department to jail your enemies?

Whether Davis’s answer will assuage the critics on the left in the Democratic Party is questionable.

According to Ben Mazzara, the local organizer for the Greater Birmingham Democracy for America chapter, a group set up by Howard Dean to help register new voters, Davis’s position is much like a lot of the Democrats in Congress now, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. They have so far refused to bring articles of impeachment against Bush-Cheney or to hold Karl Rove in “inherent contempt” for his role in the political prosecution of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman.

“They have placed winning elections above the Constitution,” Mazzara said at the cookout.

He said that may pale in comparison to how Bush and the Republicans have “eviscerated” the Constitution. But it certainly contributes to the low public approval ratings of this Congress and may cause problems after the election, he said, even if Obama wins.

According to Jonathan Turley, a constitutional law expert who often appears on MSNBC to talk about these issues, history and the country may not judge the Democrats kindly. Check out this exchange on Keith Olbermann’s show:

TURLEY: … the most remarkable if not bizarre aspect of all of this [is] that President Bush’s allies in the last seven years have been the Democratic leadership and the Democratic members that have repeatedly stepped in to protect him, not just from impeachment, but serious investigation. And it’s part of a very cynical political strategy. It has succeeded.

The Democrats know that they can retain the Congress if they just let this guy (Bush), you know, sort of ripen on the vine. And that they are afraid that there could be a backlash if they try to impeach. But of course, that’s literally all politics and no principle. They took an oath in the House of Representatives. And the most important thing they have to do as House members is to stand firm in the face of presidential crimes.

And I think history will be very, very severe, not just for Speaker Pelosi, but all of the Democrats, of how they could let this come to pass where they stood silent and did nothing in the face of such compelling criminal record.

We will see if that prediction comes true, along with another one we made awhile back when covering the issue at the time: Will the issue come back to haunt Davis if he decides to run for governor of Alabama in 2010?

Good News, Bad News Friday in Washington

Senate Passes Bush’s Spy Bill With Telecom Immunity

According to Richard Cohen, executive director of the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Davis is a fine lawyer with a promising future in politics.

“Two things were obvious about Artur from day one here,” Cohen said. “He was going to be a gifted lawyer and was destined for great things in politics.”

But according to William Crain, a regular commentor on one of the largest and most influential e-mail lists in Alabama, “Davis is DLC (Democratic Leadership Council).”

If you want to examine the nefarious ways and means of the DLC, he said, read this article and others like it on the site.

The key quote from Davis, which makes a lot of sense from a practical political point of view, goes like this.

“If you don’t win, you don’t get to do anything,” he says. “If you don’t figure out a way to translate your message into at least 51 percent of the vote, then you will not do very well.”

True, but is it possible to win elections and remain true to the Constitution at the same time? Some people think so. It just takes work to educate the people and the press.

“The reason that there is much dissention in the Democratic Party ranks today is caused by the leaders of the DLC, Hillary and Bill Clinton, Al Frome, Rahm Emmanuel (and others),” Crain said. “If you don’t like Neo-Conservatives you will certainly not like Neo-Liberals. And the DLC is Neo-Liberal. You don’t want a Neo-Liberal for governor.”

To learn more about Davis’s background and to read about some of the controversies on the sources of his campaign funding, check out this SourceWatch page, which shows he takes a lot of money from New Yorkers. You can also check out this page from OpenSecrets.org, which shows that Davis takes a lot of money from corporations such as Southern Company, one of the worst polluters in the American South.

It’s dog days in August in DC and Congress is in recess, leading some Senators, for example, to do things like campaign in Alabama by pretending to save the catfish ‘industry’.

But it appears all the “aggressive progressive” pressure on House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, the Michigan Democrat, is forcing him to take a time out from his vacation to continue his pursuit of former White House political aide and Bush’s “brain” Karl Rove — especially at it relates to his role in the prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman.

Conyers wrote a letter today requesting that the Republican National Committee hand over all documents related to Siegelman, including emails sent between the RNC and the White House. He also requested documents and emails subpoenaed by the RNC in their investigation of the politicization of the Justice Department, according to the Washington Independent, where you can read the letter.

Conyers’ letter follows last week’s ruling, which limited the right of White House officials to invoke claims of executive privilege. District Judge John Bates ruled that White House officials are not “totally immune from ever having to respond to congressional testimony” when subpoenaed. Even when the president has asserted executive privilege, officials must appear before Congress and, when appropriate, invoke executive privilege. Bates also ruled that officials must give a specific description of subpoenaed documents they’re withholding based on executive privilege.

Jill Simpson, an Alabama attorney active in the state Republican Party, told the Judiciary Committee last year that Karl Rove ordered the Justice Department to re-open a bribery probe into Siegelman, which ultimately resulted in a dubious conviction. After nearly a year of evasions based on a claim to executive privilege, Rove denied involvement in Siegelman’s prosecution in a written statement two weeks ago, but he has not done the same in sworn, public testimony. His statement did not prevent the committee from holding him in criminal contempt.

“Conyers argues that if President Bush is allowing Rove to answer written questions about the Siegelman prosecution, then what’s wrong with producing a few emails?” according to the Washington Independent’s writer.

Conyers is giving the RNC a week to respond. Rove, meanwhile, has a month to decide if he will appear before the judiciary committee, which will almost certainly subpoena the “boy genius” when it reconvenes.

We can’t wait to see what happens next. Now if someone in DC or New York would put their money where their mouth is about looking into how President George W. Bush is in-the-loop in this whole thing, and going after certain documents as we have suggested, we might get to the ultimate truth in this thing yet … well before the history books are written.

If everyone wants to live in this corrupt monarchy awhile longer — because they are making money off the federal treasury and the privatized offshoots too — then we can let the economy collapse and the revolution begin and read about it in the history books later.

But that’s really not necessary. There are a few people around who are smart enough to stop this rape and plunder now. Can you find the courage to share?

Glynn Wilson

House Speaker Nanci Pelosi speaking in Birmingham earlier this year…

Citizen Journalism Contest

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi just published a book called Know Your Power: A Message to America’s Daughters.

Bob Fertik at Democrats.com has not yet read her book, but he wonders if her “message to America’s daughters” does not encourage them to rise to positions of power and then turn a blind eye to those who start wars based on lies that kill and mutilate hundreds of thousands of daughters and force millions to become refugees and prostitutes… who torture and murder prisoners who are the sons and husbands of daughters… who out-covert CIA operatives who are daughters, etc.

Pelosi kicked off her book tour on “The View” and Joy Behar asked her, “Why do you insist on not impeaching these people so that the world and America can really see the crimes that they’ve committed?” Pelosi did her best to avoid answering, but finally said:

“If somebody had a crime that the president had committed, that would be a different story… unless you have the goods that this president committed these crimes.”

Speaker Pelosi, meet Representative Dennis Kucinich. He’s “somebody” and he “has” 35+1=36 impeachable offenses, most of them involving statutory crimes — and “the goods that this president committed” them. In fact, he presented them to Congress in the exact form specified by the Founding Fathers: Articles of Impeachment. You even gave John Conyers permission to hold a hearing on Kucinich’s “crimes.”

So we have a simple question to follow-up on Joy Behar’s question:

Of the 36 detailed Articles of Impeachment introduced by Dennis Kucinich, do you consider any to be crimes? If yes, which? If no, why not — and what (if anything) would you consider an impeachable offense?

We’ve asked this question through Speaker Pelosi’s office, but we’ve never received an answer to our questions.

So we’re also announcing a Citizen Journalism Contest: We’ll pay up to $1,000 to any progressive citizen (or journalist) who succeeds in getting a direct and substantive answer to this question, and records it on video or audio tape for publication on Democrats.com.

Pelosi’s book tour includes call-in shows and book signings, so we encourage you to take advantage of every opportunity to ask her this question.

We also encourage you to do your homework before you ask Pelosi our question, so you can pin her down more successfully. Start by reading Kucinich’s 35+1 Articles of Impeachment. It makes sense to focus on one or several that you are familiar with already.

According to the Constitution, a President can be impeached for “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” There is no definition that is more precise; former House Minority Leader (and later President) Gerald Ford said, “An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history.”

“High Crimes” are generally considered to mean abuses of the power of office, whether or not those actions are “crimes” outside the context of government. For example, Bush’s refusal to enforce duly-enacted laws by attaching legally-meaningless “signing statements” is one of the High Crimes documented in Kucinich’s Articles of Impeachment.

“High Crimes” can also include familiar felonies like murder, torture, and fraud, which are also documented in Kucinich’s Articles of Impeachment.

To start impeachment hearings, the House does not need to have “proof beyond a shadow of a doubt,” as a jury would need to convict someone of a crime. “Impeachment” in the House is the legal equivalent of “indictment” by a grand jury. The House simply collects evidence to present to the Senate for a trial. So the relevant standard for House evidence would be the lower standard of “probable cause.”

George Bush openly admits he committed several of Kucinich’s crimes, including approving warrantless wiretapping in violation of FISA and the Fourth Amendment. Bush also instructed current and former officials to refuse to comply with Congressional subpoenas and contempt citations. The House does not need to investigate these crimes, they can simply vote for the relevant Articles of Impeachment.

If you succeed, contact us with the details.

Once again, we’ll pay up to $1,000 to any progressive citizen (or journalist) who succeeds in getting a direct and substantive answer to this question, and records it on video or audio tape for publication on Democrats.com.

Fine print:

The amount of the award will depend on the specificity and depth of Pelosi’s answer in our judgment. A simple “Yes” or “No” is worth $100.

An award will be made only for each unique answer; for example, the $100 award for “Yes” or “No” will only be awarded the first time.

To qualify as a “progressive” citizen or journalist, you must be active with a known progressive group or news organization or website (including Democrats.com). Your activity can be as limited as volunteering or posting comments.

Good luck!

For more information, visit: Democrats.com.

Book Tour Schedule

Here’s a partial list of public appearances where you might catch her.

Author Tour Dates

Updates Below

It may be a symbolic movement only, but at least it shows there are some people in the United States of America who still believe in the Constitution and the rule of law.

The House Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing today, live on C-SPAN only and not being covered by the so-called mainstream news media, about the “imperial presidency of George W. Bush.”

Here’s how it’s being reported in a guest blog editorial by one of the activists leading the charge.

by David Swanson
AfterDowningStreet.Org

The House Judiciary Committee will put impeachment squarely back “on the table” today and restore to its prominent place in our Constitution.

Elliott Adams, President of Veterans for Peace, and a descendant of American revolutionary Sam Adams, will deliver this prepared testimony, in which, if his 5 minutes allow him to reach his conclusion, he will say:

“For us veterans, when our time came, we volunteered our very lives for this republic; for the principle of freedom for all, for equal opportunity for all, to defend the Constitution and the principles embodied in the Declaration of Independence, and to guarantee the opportunity for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Now, Congressmen, it is your time, and I hear there is not enough time! Now is your time, and I hear it will not be good for one party or the other party! Now is your time, and I hear there is not enough political will around you! When our founding fathers signed the Declaration of Independence they were not worried about political will, or how much time there was, or about any parties’ political future, they were just worried they were going to be hanged by the neck. But they did what was right. Now it is your time to standup. Einstein said – ‘The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.’”

Bruce Fein, Associate Deputy Attorney General, 1981-82, and Chairman of the American Freedom Agenda, will deliver this prepared testimony, beginning with this:

“If President George W. Bush had knocked to enter the constitutional convention in Philadelphia in 1787, presiding convention president George Washington would have denied him admission. Thereby hangs an alarming tale. The executive branch has vandalized the Constitution every bit as much [sic] the barbarians vandalized Rome in 410 AD. The executive branch has destroyed the Constitution’s time-honored checks and balances and raced the nation perilously close to executive despotism. The executive branch rejects the basic philosophical tenets of the United States. It does not accept that America was conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that sovereignty in a republican form of government lies with the people; that there are no vassals or serfs in the Constitution’s landscape; that every man or woman is a king or queen but no one wears a crown; and, that the rule of law is the nation’s civic religion. The Founding Fathers fashioned impeachment as a remedy for attacks against the constitutional order.”

The first panel Friday morning will include Congressman Dennis Kucinich making a case for impeachment based on the articles of impeachment he has drafted against Cheney and Bush. Also on the first panel will be Republican Congressman Walter Jones who has sought to end the funding of the occupation of Iraq, and who has expressed support for former prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi’s proposal to prosecute former President George W. Bush, once out of office, for murder. Congressman Maurice Hinchey, a supporter of impeachment, is also on the panel.

The last witness is Congressman Brad Miller, but as the saying goes, “Three out of four ain’t bad.” And we’ve been mercifully spared Congresswoman Jane Harman, who at one point was scheduled to testify.

The second of two planned panels is even better, and includes Adams, Fein, Bugliosi, and six other witnesses. One of them, Elizabeth Holtzman, Former Representative from New York, will speak very persuasively for impeachment. Ross C. “Rocky” Anderson, Founder and President, High Roads for Human Rights, and the former Mayor of Salt Lake City, is likely to speak in support of impeachment too, while also supporting other alleged remedies.

One chronicler of Bush and Cheney crimes who in recent months has opposed impeachment is John Dean; he had been scheduled to appear but did not make the final cut. However, there are four witnesses on the second panel who may not help the cause of impeachment. Frederick A. O. Schwarz, Jr., Senior Counsel, Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, is a supporter of restoring the rule of law, but whether he’ll advocate restoration of the rule of the Constitution we shall see.

The other three almost certainly will not. They are: Bob Barr, Former Representative from Georgia, 2008 Libertarian Nominee for President; Stephen Presser, Raoul Berger Professor of Legal History, Northwestern University School of Law; and Jeremy A. Rabkin, Professor of Law, George Mason University School of Law.

The big unknown is which members of the House Judiciary Committee, which has 40 members, will show up for a Friday hearing. A number of Republicans have already left town, and some of the most pro-impeachment Democrats have committed to being present. Watch Robert Wexler, Tammy Baldwin, and Sheila Jackson-Lee for the most likely statements in support of beginning a true impeachment hearing.

Some of the witnesses in the past couple of days had expressed frustration with congressional rules forbidding accusations against the president, rules deriving from prohibitions on speaking ill of the king of England. But witnesses have been able to work around those rules by referring to “the executive branch” and other similar locutions rather than “the president” or “the vice president.”

While Chairman John Conyers almost certainly has every intention of preventing the commencement of a real impeachment hearing, he and his staff appear to have opened this one up significantly to the obvious and over-documented case for impeachment. Our hope lies in the likelihood that Conyers’ calculation is wrong when he supposes that Democrats will benefit from publicizing the case for impeachment and not suffer for failing to pursue it. If the public makes clear its demand for action, not just talk, the door that is cracking open may be very difficult to shut. “Stop the preaching and start impeaching” is a cheer that may be heard at a gathering of impeachment activists outside the Rayburn Building immediately following the hearing.

The day before the hearing, some of those impeachment advocates gathered at the National Press Club, including myself, Ray McGovern, Bruce Fein, Cindy Sheehan, Cynthia Papermaster, and Crystal Kim. Videos of what they had to say, and their questions and answers with the media, are posted here.

We’ll be watching … will the American people?

Ad 1: Here’s the witness list:

The House Judiciary Committee has released its witness list for Friday’s hearing on Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s (D-Ohio) impeachment resolution. One big surprise – a House Republican will testify.

Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.), a huge critic of President Bush’s policy in Iraq, is scheduled to appear before the Judiciary Committee, according to a witness list just released by the panel.

Former Rep. Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party’s presidential candidate, is also scheduled to testify. Barr was a Republican from Georgia during four terms in the House.

Kucinich, as expected, will testify as well.

Here’s the full witness list released by the Judiciary Committee for Friday’s session:

The Honorable Dennis Kucinich, Representative from Ohio
The Honorable Maurice Hinchey, Representative from New York
The Honorable Walter Jones, Representative from North Carolina
The Honorable Brad Miller, Representative from North Carolina

Panel Two

The Honorable Elizabeth Holtzman, Former Representative from New York
The Honorable Bob Barr, Former Representative from Georgia, 2008 Libertarian Nominee for President
The Honorable Ross C. “Rocky” Anderson, Founder and President, High Roads for Human Rights
Stephen Presser, Raoul Berger Professor of Legal History, Northwestern University School of Law
Bruce Fein, Associate Deputy Attorney General, 1981-82, Chairman, American Freedom Agenda
Vincent Bugliosi, Author and former Los Angeles County Prosecutor
Jeremy A. Rabkin, Professor of Law, George Mason University School of Law
Elliott Adams, President of the Board, Veterans for Peace
Frederick A. O. Schwarz, Jr., Senior Counsel, Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law

Ad 2: The Daily Kos blog has more details here.

Interesting viewing, although it is still not clear this is going anywhere. And I can find no mainstream news organization covering it online.

Ad 3: I got through to the press office of Rep. Artur Davis, who is not in attendance at the hearing, and his spokesperson, Sarah Kate Sullivan, said he “had a scheduling conflict” and was “on his way back to Alabama.”

Ad 4: Kucinich Testifies on Abuses of Executive Power

On Oversight of the Department of Justice
And the Imperial Presidency of George W. Bush

The House Judiciary Committee will question and hear testimony from Attorney General Michael Mukasey on Wednesday beginning at 10 a.m. in a hearing on oversight the U.S. Department of Justice, according to the committee’s Website.

Then on July 25, the committee will hold a hearing on the Imperial Presidency of George W. Bush and possible legal responses.

“Over the last seven plus years, there have been numerous credible allegations of serious misconduct by officials in the Bush Administration,” Conyers said in a statement. “At the same time, the administration has adopted what many would describe as a radical view of its own powers and authorities. As Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, I believe it is imperative that we pursue a comprehensive review commensurate to this constitutionally dangerous combination of circumstances. Friday’s hearings will be an important part of that ongoing effort.”

The Committee is expected to examine a range of legal and legislative responses to allegations of administration misconduct and their expansion of executive branch power.

Since the beginning of the 110th Congress, the Committee has conducted extensive oversight into allegations of misconduct by the administration, including: (1) improper politicization of the Justice Department and the U.S. Attorneys’ offices, including potential misuse of authority with regard to election and voting controversies; (2) misuse of executive branch authority and the adoption and implementation of the so-called unitary executive theory, including in the areas of presidential signing statements and regulatory authority; (3) misuse of investigatory and detention authority with regard to U.S. citizens and foreign nationals, including questions regarding the legality of the administration’s surveillance, detention, interrogation, and rendition programs; (4) manipulation of intelligence and misuse of war powers, including possible misrepresentations to Congress related thereto; (5) improper retaliation against administration critics, including disclosing information concerning CIA operative Valerie Plame, and obstruction of justice related thereto; and (6) misuse of authority in denying Congress and the American people the ability to oversee and scrutinize conduct within the administration, including through the use of various asserted privileges and immunities.

The July 25 hearing will be held at 10 a.m. in room 2141 of the Rayburn House Office Building. Additional information, including witness participation, will be announced.

To coincide with the hearings, the National Impeachment Network (NIN) began its “Choose the Constitution” campaign to bring citizens to Washington, D.C., from July 21 to 25 to personally tell members of Congress to Choose the Constitution by using the remedy of impeachment and to ask them to attend the hearing on impeachment of the full House Judiciary Committee on July 25 at 10 a.m.

The second goal is to expand the news of the hearings nationwide and to ask the media for coverage. For those in D.C. on July 25 there will be a pre-hearing rally at 9 a.m. in front of the Rayburn Building.

Delegation members have been astounded by the response they’ve received, according to the group’s press release.

“During our two week lobbying experience in D.C. we have found the most effective way to present our message is in-person,” says Cynthia Papermaster, NIN Co-Founder.

The NIN lobbyists are taking a positive, supportive approach toward Congress members who have already voiced their support for impeachment, she said. To date more than forty members of Congress have cosponsors of articles of impeachment or demanded immediate impeachment hearings.

During their first three days in D.C., members of the NIN delegation met with Representatives Mike Hinchey (D) New York, Dennis Kucinich (D) Ohio, John Conyers (D) Michigan, Robert Wexler (D) Florida, Lynn Woolsey (D) California and Walter Jones (R) North Carolina.

Following a Wednesday, July 9, afternoon meeting with Dennis Kucinich in which he said he was sending an announcement to members of Congress regarding the presentation of a new impeachment resolution, and after an hour-long early evening meeting with Judiciary Chairman, John Conyers, on Thursday morning Nancy Pelosi said “impeachment hearings may take place.”

One of the goals of the lobbying effort is to present “win-win” solutions,” she said. “They have considered the dilemma that Congressional Representatives find themselves in during this re-election season when most people are concerned about the economy, fuel prices, mortgages and health care.”

Democratic members are concerned that memories of the Clinton impeachment will create a negative backlash from their constituents. The group has offered to work with Congress, to educate and rally the people, and has assured them of support during the election if they stand up for impeachment.

The group offers evidence and reminders of the Nixon years and reminds people that House and Senate members took the first steps towards impeachment then and “have gone down in history.”

Also, a look at history shows that the party that starts impeachment wins the next election.

The National Impeachment Network is a non-partisan umbrella under which activist groups, businesses and individuals that support the impeachment process provided under the constitution can unite, coordinate, and expand the movement. Currently NIN reaches out to more than 40 coordinators and 160,000 activists who in turn reach out to more groups, friends and neighbors.

“Due to continuing education and outreach to members of Congress and the public the movement for impeachment is becoming louder,” the group says.

The next and greatest challenge, she said, is to getting the media to report on it.

For more information contact Cynthia Papermaster, Co-founder and NIN representative in Washington, D.C., at (510)333-6097, or Sandra Marshall in California at (805) 440-2547.

To learn more about the National Impeachment Network visit Nationalimpeachment.org.

Come to DC for this Historic Moment:
“Hearing on the Imperial Presidency of George W. Bush”

July 22 – 24: “Impeachment Lobbying Days”
House of Representatives

July 25, 9 a.m.: “Choose the Constitution”
Press Conference and Rally
Rayburn Building, Independence Avenue

July 25, 10 a.m.: Hearing “The Imperial Presidency of George W. Bush”
House Judiciary Committee, Rayburn Bldg, Rm. 2141

“There are two panels being planned for the hearing. One consisting of Kucinich and four other members of Congress (Jane Harman, Walter Jones, Brad Miller, and Maurice Hinchey); the other consisting of five non-Congress Members (Elizabeth Holtzman, Bruce Fein, Frederick Schwartz, John Dean, and Bob Barr).”

As of Tuesday more than 87 thousand people have signed a petition asking the Judiciary Committee to hold Karl Rove in contempt of Congress for ignoring a House subpoena and to send him to jail.

Rove’s attorney Robert Luskin asserted executive privilege as an excuse to ignore Congress; however, President Bush has not invoked the privilege, according to FireDogLake.com.

And why would he, since that would be an admission that the President sought advice on the politicization of the Department of Justice?

Furthermore, Rep. Linda Sanchez of the House Judiciary says absolute immunity only applies to current executive aides.

Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman was interviewed about the events and is quoted in this short video.

Guest Editorial: Cheers and Jeers
From DailyKos.com
by Bill in Portland Maine

From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…

Dear President Bush,

It’s been awhile since we talked. Just busy, I guess.

Anyway, I want to Congratulate you. You win. In fact, you win big-time. It’s time for me to admit it: you came, you saw, you kicked ass.

Over the course of the past seven and a half years, you and your wingman Dick Cheney have gotten virtually everything you demanded, much if it without a fight.

You used a national tragedy to clamp down on Americans’ civil liberties and launch a war against a country that neither caused that tragedy nor threatened us at all.

You pretty much halted government-supported scientific research and environmental protection in their tracks. You did nothing to solve the health care crisis.

You politicized the Justice Department. You worked hard to breach the church-state levee in the government, and then played patty-cake while the real levees collapsed into countless people’s back yards. You gave big business (especially big oil, big finance and big military-industrial complex) free reign to “self-police.” You made your elite base very, very rich, while using your shiny lapel pin to awe-strike your poorer, more ignorant base.

I mean, you are so talented that you even managed to break the Census Bureau. My gosh, even Reagan couldn’t figure out how to do that.

And through it all you avoided repercussions. Even losing GOP House and Senate majorities hasn’t slowed you down much.

There’s so much raw evidence to impeach your ass that it would be as easy as Dick Cheney shooting a lawyer in the face. The rap sheet is a mile long. Yet you remain 100 percent unscathed, threatened by nothing more than a pretzel getting stuck in your craw. That’s amazing. My peasant hat is off to you.

Seriously, all you’ve “suffered” (if you can call it that) is low approval ratings. Big deal. As long as you have your 25 percent “base” that thinks you walk on water, you can do anything you want. Smirk. Dance. Ride your bike. Wave. Swagger. Intimidate the Democratic leadership with the word “Boo!”, beat the traditional media so senseless that when you say “jump” they put on rocket shoes and blast off for the stratosphere. Smirk some more. Clear some more brush. Hell, you can do pretty much anything you damn well please.

So, sincerely: congratulations. You may have wrecked the country and your party, but so what? You got everything that you, George W. Bush, wanted out of your time in office. You should have no regrets, since you telescoped your intentions to everyone well in advance (yes, even back in school).

And in seven months you’ll retire and open up a Texas-size think tank disguised as a presidential library that will perpetuate your propaganda and your policies. (“Oh look, Heritage Foundation … you have a baby brother!”)

Many will say your administration was a failure, but that only works if they’re thinking about the welfare of the country and its 300 million citizens. Your presidency was never about them (just ask the Supreme Court) – it was about you taking care of your circle of rich, power-hungry, war-mad cronies while simultaneously setting out to prove how much the federal government can suck. On that score, you may indeed be the best president ever.

Love,
Billy

P.S. Hugs to Laura and the twins.